Sometimes I need to see the change..........

So I was scrolling through some pics on FB and found a picture the other day that horrified me. I was a picture of me 4 years ago...4 years and 2 days to be exact. I can not believe that I was that person, that I looked like that. It made me sad but it also made me realize how much I have changed, how my efforts are not in vain but they really are paying off. I might not see it everyday but that day I needed to see it. I'm not ready to give up or give in but I have been frustrated with this journey for the past few weeks. That being said, I took the horrifying picture and smooshed it next to a current picture, the result, well you take a gander, tell me what you think.

Yep that was me and that is me. There are a few things that are going on here but first and for most, I have a neck now.  Yesterday, I showed this picture to my friend/mentor/licensing supervisor. She said, "the picture is amazing but how much more incredible would it be if we could have taken a picture of you inside then and now." Well that really got me thinking. That Melissa, the old one, that Melissa was broken, hated herself, and was slowly day by day killing herself and was ok with that because that Melissa did not think she deserved anything better. That me didn't know how to live. That Melissa did not know that she was loved, that Melissa was miserable, that Melissa was a big ball of walking insecurity, shame, guilt, and bitterness. I can see that person, sometimes I can hear her small voice in the back of my head, but I don't know that person any longer. I don't mourn the loss of that person, I do not miss that person. I love me, now. I love the me that I am in this moment, on this journey, and the me that I am becoming. Sometimes you need to be reminded of where you came from. Sometimes you need to see it in the physical and then sometimes you need to be able to go deeper, you need to look and see the changes that go beyond the physical because honestly, this isn't about the fact that I found an actual neck, this is about being able to look someone in the eye and not be ashamed or apologetic of the person I am. This is about loving and accepting me.

 

Apples & Oranges

You cannot compare people anymore than you can compare apples and oranges. Well you can compare them but you will ultimately end up frustrated, take it from an expert. I recently found myself in a situation where I was comparing 2 different people in my life, I have been completely frustrated and at times hurt because Person A is not like Person B and I really, really want them to be. But just like fruit, the similarities in people are mostly in the physical.

Apples and oranges are both fruit, have skin, seeds, and inner flesh. Both are colorful and have lots of varieties. Same can be said for people. But here is where it gets tricky. An apple can never be an orange. If I pick up an apple and get frustrated and angry because it does not taste like an orange, well that is my problem, not the apple's. For me to expect an apple to change everything about itself and to become an orange, then I am not truly accepting the apple.

So the moral of my story. If you are expecting an apple to become an orange or even just want the apple to be more like an orange, you are going to end up frustrated and possibly damaging your relationship with the apple because you are placing expectations on the apple that the apple cannot fulfill.

Exposure

I remember laying in bed the first night I was in the Philippines. It was crazy hot, I was in the middle of the jungle (okay, maybe not the jungle but it looked more jungle than anywhere else I had ever been), there were no windows and the crazy sounds coming from the lizards on the wall (yes, they make crying noises) it was all closing in on me. I started seeing shadows on the wall it looked like a snake and then I froze when I swear I saw the shadow of a lion on the wall. I started getting scared, I started doubting that I made the right decision to come, I started visualizing how I was going to die, I began freaking out, I had all sort of crazy thoughts, worst possible situations and horrible outcomes. I laid there for what seemed like forever and then finally I gathered the nerve to get up and turn on the light. It was a tree, the shadow of a fricking tree.

I learned a lesson that night, I lesson I still use almost 15 years later. Things in the dark are always scarier, when left in the dark the scarier and bigger they get but when you expose them to the light they aren't as scary.

This works for everything in my opinion, but for me it was all about my thought life. I have crazy, ridiculous, irrational thoughts for the first 30+ years of my life I kept all those thoughts to myself, they grew, gnawed, and crept into and took over every area of my life. These thoughts overtook my mind and consumed my heart. They fed on each other and became so consuming that I completely shut down. But a few years ago I remembered laying in that bed in the Philippines. I remembered the difference that exposure makes. I was at a point where I had almost given up hope and I knew I needed to do something drastic. I talked to someone I trusted and I exposed one of those thoughts, a tiny one. What I realized in that moment is that the moment that I exposed that thought, it was ridiculous, it lost its power. I started talking more, I started exposing more, and I began to be able to stand against the thoughts. I began to see them for what they were irrational, ridiculous lies. I still struggle and it's not easy but it is so much better.

 You have to speak to the thoughts you can't just keep it all inside because it just grows and becomes stronger and consuming and the longer it is kept inside the scarier it gets to expose it. I get it, I fully understand. Pastor Bill says that you cannot combat thoughts with thoughts you beat thoughts with words, with the Word. Follow me here: The Bible is God's word-->Jesus is part of God--> Jesus is the light--> thus we use God's word and the Light to combat the lies and the thoughts and the icky parts we keep hidden inside because we are to scared to expose it.

Do you have thoughts or habits or things you have had hidden inside of you for so long that they have consumed your life and your heart? For me the thoughts were ingrained in me, I was so consumed I just shut down. The longer you keep those thoughts in the dark, the bigger they grow, the more power you give them. YOU have to take action, combat them, speak to them OUTLOUD, speak the Word, speak life, expose them to the light. Because I honestly don't know that there is any other way to beat them.